


Rahim

by Tafferling



Category: Dying Light (Video Game)
Genre: Additional Reading, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-10
Updated: 2017-06-26
Packaged: 2018-11-12 11:40:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11161125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tafferling/pseuds/Tafferling
Summary: "I need a friend,"Kyle Crane says, and gives Rahim a chance to prove himself out past the bleak safety of the Tower walls.





	1. I need a friend.

**Author's Note:**

> This is complimentary reading to Latchkey Hero, and will consist mostly out of loosely connected scenes out of Rahim's POV. Since the boy now has a much larger role to play in my main fic, I can't get away with winging his character any more and need a little bit of practice... 
> 
> And there's a lot of character development and background that I've squeezed in, but not enough room, so all of that will go here as well. 
> 
> Work is unedited and unpolished, and will remain so.

A sharp knock draws Rahim's attention away from his can of beans. With the fork stuck in his mouth, he looks up. Him and everyone else in the rec room, they're all equally startled out of their lunch routine and pause with shovelling today's rations into empty stomachs.

"What's up, kid?" Leaning in the doorway, his knuckles still on the wooden frame, stands Kyle Crane. He's geared up for business outside the Tower's bleak concrete walls, a hatchet snug against one thigh, and his well worn pistol holster under his shoulder. And he looks _smug._

Rahim bristles. _Kid._ Always kid, but he bites down a retort with his teeth clicking against the silverware.

"Lunch," he answers around the fork, so it comes out more like _ansch._ Lame. Absolutely lame. So he drops the fork into the can and rubs at his neck trying to squeeze the hint of heat from it.  

"Yeah, I can see that. You almost done?" Crane steps inside. Nods a greeting at the other faces in the room.

Rahim glances down, at all the air he'd been eating with the last few bites. He nods. "You need anything?" _Moving furniture again? Cleaning out a duct somewhere? Chasing pigeons off the roof?_ He’s getting real tired of the latter, even if the view up there is about the only redeeming feature the slums have left.

"A friend," Crane says, shoots him a smile. "I need a friend. Lena mentioned you've been itching to get out, and I'm a partner short, so what you think?"

 _Yespleaseabsolutelywherearewegoing?!_ Rahim chokes on thin air. "What?"

It's been weeks since that shitty night in which he'd tried to be a hero, and managed just about to mess everything up. He's got Crane to thank that he's still breathing. And Lena for how she'd put up with him day by day as he'd tried to be anywhere but confined to a bed while his wounds healed. _"You should be dead",_ she'd said time and time again. He should have been, he knows that, and things might have been better if that's how it had turned out.

Not a day passes that he doesn't wonder that. And he hates himself for how weak the thought makes him. How it gets into his gut and he's left feeling like a child forgotten in the dark. Rahim frowns.

"Fi told me to _bugger off,_ " Crane clarifies. He smirks. "And not even I'm suicidal enough to get in the way of the mood she's in right now. Ayo needs his job finished before nightfall though— so, let's try this again: You up for for it, kid?"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Loss is an adhesive," Lena had said once, smiling. A sad smile. "It makes people stick." 
> 
> But Rahim really, really doesn't want or need Crane to stick to him. More specifically, he doesn't need a substitute big brother, some poor imitation of lost family.

Oh, he's up for it. He's absolutely up for it. Or so he thinks. Right atop the Tower's front landing, Rahim hesitates. It's bright out here. Bright and vast and  _ open.  _ Pale blue skies are dappled white by torn clouds, and the slums pull away past the steps he's hovering at. The tips of his well worn, dirty shoes scuff lightly at an edge. 

He remembers the last time he took them. Two at a time, three almost, and then he'd hit the pavement running, giddy with excitement. Back then, he'd felt invincible. Invincible and ready, the only weight on him an explosive charge in his pack. 

Now he's no longer excited. No longer up for it. He's scared. Dull pain pulls on his gut and tracks up his thigh. It's a stupid ass phantom ache left by a bone deep bite, and from where he'd been torn open while falling for his life. Quite literally. It had been either a trip to the gravel through the air, or a bridge full of Biters ripping him apart. He'd chosen, and maybe he'd chosen poorly, and Rahim can't help but wonder again and again and again and fucking  _ again,  _ if he'd set things in motion that took his sister from him.   

Crane notices the hesitation. Notices a lot of things, probably. He's attentive as fuck. And nosy. Daily check-ups in the infirmary. Frequent visits to the  _ Radio Harran  _ station after they'd moved it to the top of the Tower. A lot of  _ How you doing kid  _ laced with guilt, because he'd been there when Jade had died. 

_ "Loss is an adhesive,"  _ Lena had said once, smiling. A sad smile.  _ "It makes people stick."  _

But Rahim really,  _ really  _ doesn't want or need Crane to stick to him. More specifically, he doesn't need a substitute big brother, some poor imitation of lost family. 

What he needs is being given a chance.

He sorts of gets it today. Least once he takes a deep breath and his feet snap down the steps one at a time. Crane offers him a slow nod, a smile attached to it that's a little heavy on the left corner, and then juts his chin along the path leading out to the small bridge heading into the battered slums.

It's not some great deed they're setting out for though. Their little quest isn't about to change Harran. For better  _ or  _ worse. 

There's a makeshift ramp that gets them up on the first row of shanty buildings, but they aren't in a big hurry to get there. Least Crane isn't, his head swiveling left and right as he scans for movement. Little to nothing stirs that close to the Tower these days. Except for rats and seagulls drifting in to pick through the trash the Storm left behind. 

The Storm, capital S, is why they're out— why a lot of things need doing these days, anyway. In all his eighteen years, Rahim hadn't ever seen one like it. 

Neither had Harran, least not for a long time. And with no one around to run interference while water had ripped at it and winds torn down the less sturdy buildings,  _ this  _ was what was left of it. Or the slums in particular: a wasteland of blown over shanties underneath the overpasses, and weathered concrete blocks for buildings with a lot of their tops blown off. 

Crane had mentioned Old Town looking better, but that looks aint everything, mostly because the infrastructure protected the Biters better than it did here. And for some absolutely stupid reason, there seemed to be even more of them now.

Which doesn't mean the slums are safe in comparison to the Zero. Hell no. Twice his footing almost fails him because of rotten wood. Then they're crossing into the more densely populated bowl of the slums, right where the overpasses intersect, and there's a pack of Biters that piles into a meshed fence and come crashing through while he pauses to mock them.

Crane slaps him over the back of his head once they're done jogging for safety. But he's grinning, so Rahim takes it as a win. Eventually, the trek across trash-crusted alleys and wobbly roofs leads them to their underwhelming objective. Its close enough to barely wind Crane, but far enough for Rahim to feel the burn creeping up in his thighs. Maybe laps around a Tower floor isn't enough cardio these days. That, and the makeshift parkour training ground really doesn't compare to the real thing. 

While Crane handles business (something about needing more hands down at the fisher village to rebuild the fences, and a face to face offer for trade for those hands), Rahim hovers awkwardly around the safe houses' lookout lounging in a bent plastic chair. 

"Hey, aren't you the kid that runs the radio?" The lookout isn't a Harran local. Poor bastard shouldn't have ever come here. He's throwing him a smile under a thick, blonde beard and scratching at sunburnt skin on his cheek.

Rahim nods. "Yeah." 

"It's great. The station, I mean. But you could use more music."

"Thanks," he manages, right past a pang of irritation almost getting him to ask the dude if he has some CDs lying around that'll fucking help with that, when Crane ambles up to them. The outburst stays tucked away. 

"Ready to roll?" Crane asks. He's shrugging his shoulders and shifting his feet, like he's pumping himself up for the trip back. 

"Sure." This time, Rahim knows he sounds way less enthusiastic than he did a few hours ago. "Seriously though man, you didn't need me for this at all, did you?"

Crane shrugs. "Probably not." He drops a hand on Rahim's shoulder and squeezes a littler harder than he needs to. "But I needed to see how you're holding up out here. Karim and Ayo won't put you on the Runner roster otherwise." 

_ Oh shit.  _ "Did I pass?"

"With flying colours." Crane flashes him a grin and winks, gives him another squeeze for good measure alone, and then shoves him towards the general direction of the Tower scratching for the light purple evening sky.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More character study for Rahim :D I think I got a handle on where he is with the loss of his sister now, and how he dealt with his recovery. Time to move on to other issues.

**Author's Note:**

> Anyone'd like to see a specific Dying Light side quest written out of Rahim's POV? (Except _The Gunsmith_ and _Searchlights._ )


End file.
